1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to hearing aids. More specifically the invention relates to a removable battery compartment for a hearing aid. The invention also relates to a hearing aid comprising such a battery compartment.
2. The Prior Art
Battery compartments for hearing aids may be constructed in various ways. One common way is to construct the battery compartment as a drawer or a holder, in which the battery is placed, upon which the drawer is pushed from an open position into a closed position in the housing. In this way the housing serves to close the battery compartment. Such a drawer is illustrated in e.g. U.S. Pat. No. 3,475,566. Typically the holder has a pivot point about which the holder rotates while being pushed into the housing. Such holders are illustrated in e.g. WO-A-00/21335 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,588,064.
Moreover the pivoting motion, or at least a part of it, is in some designs used to slide the battery terminals over a set of contacts, thereby allowing the motion also to be used for switching the hearing aid on and off, or for performing other switching functions as in the above U.S. Pat. No. 5,588,064. Retaining means may be provided to hold the battery compartment in the closed position, and possibly in an intermediate position where the power supply to the hearing aid is interrupted but the battery is not accessible for removal.
For removal of the battery, the compartment is removed from, withdrawn from or pivoted out of the housing to a position where the battery is accessible for removal. This however involves a concern, because different people have different needs. For certain persons, such as small children, it is desirable to restrict the access to the battery compartment, as there is otherwise a risk that they could remove the battery and possibly swallow it. On the other hand, generally providing hearing aids, or the drawers of such, with a child-proof locking mechanism is not desirable, because a considerable number of hearing aid users are elderly people not always physically able to perform the delicate manipulations necessary to overcome the child-proof locking mechanism. There is thus a problem in providing a hearing aid that serves the above different needs of different people.